Istanbul - South African Judy Favish, who spent two days in Istanbul as a layover on her way home from Dublin, had just checked in at Istanbul's Ataturk Airport when she heard an explosion followed by gunfire and a loud bang.
She says she hid under the counter for some time.
Officials on Wednesday morning began assessing the damage caused at the airport by three suicide bombers who killed at least 36 and wounded more than 150.
Workers were brought in to remove debris left by the blast, while in the daylight the damage to the terminal became clearer with even ceiling panels hit.
The airport was partially reopened on Wednesday, with the information board inside the airport showing that about one third of scheduled flights have been cancelled, with a host of others delayed.
Witnesses and officials said one attacker had opened fire in the departures hall with an automatic rifle, sending passengers diving for cover and trying to flee, before all three blew themselves up in or around the arrivals hall a floor below, witnesses and officials said.
Police fired shots to try to stop two of the attackers just before they reached a security checkpoint at the arrivals hall, but they detonated their explosives, a Turkish official said.
On Tuesday night hundreds of passengers flooded out of the airport after the attack.
Favish says passengers were ushered to a cafeteria at the basement level where they were kept for more than an hour before being allowed outside.
Two other South African tourists, Paul and Susie Roos from Cape Town, were at the airport and due to fly home at the time of the explosions on Tuesday. They were shaken by what they witnessed.
Paul said: “We came up from the arrivals to the departures, up the escalator when we heard these shots going off.”
He added: “There was this guy going roaming around, he was dressed in black and he had a hand gun.
“We ducked behind a counter but I stood up and watched him. Two explosions went off shortly after one another. By that time he had stopped shooting,” Roos said.
“He turned around and started coming towards us. He was holding his gun inside his jacket. He looked around anxiously to see if anyone was going to stop him and then went down the escalator ... We heard some more gunfire and then another explosion, and then it was over.”
Twelve-year-old Hevin Zini had just arrived from Dusseldorf with her family and was in tears from the shock.
She told the Associated Press that there was blood on the ground and everything was blown up to bits.
A woman named Duygu, who was at passport control after arriving from Germany, said she threw herself to the floor after the explosion. “Everyone started running away. Everywhere was covered with blood and body parts. I saw bullet holes on the doors,” she said.
Ali Tekin, who was at the arrivals hall waiting for a guest, said the roof came down after an “extremely loud” explosion.
“Inside the airport it is terrible, you can't recognise it, the damage is big,” Tekin said.
Most of those killed were Turkish nationals but foreigners were also among the dead, a Turkish official said.
Another senior government official says the death toll could climb much higher.
The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity in line with government protocol, also said all initial indications suggest the Islamic State group was behind the attack.
The attack on Europe's third-busiest airport was one of the deadliest in a series of suicide bombings in Turkey, which is part of the US-led coalition against Islamic State and is struggling to contain the spillover from neighbouring Syria's civil war. It is also battling an insurgency by Kurdish militants in its largely Kurdish south-east.
Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan strongly condemned the terror attackin a statement late on Tuesday.
“This attack once again revealed the dark face of terrorist organisations targeting innocent civilians.” Erdogan said in the written statement.
“It is obvious that this attack does not aim to attain any results but merely aims to produce propaganda material against our country by shedding the blood of and causing pain for innocent civilians.”
Erdogan stated that the attack, which took place during the holy month of Ramadaan, shows that terrorism strikes with no regard for faith and values. He appealed to governments, parliaments, media and civil society organisations around the world to take a firm stand against terrorism.
Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said: “This attack, targeting innocent people is a vile, planned terrorist act.”
“There is initial evidence that each of the three suicide bombers blew themselves up after opening fire,” he told reporters at the airport. Yildirim said the attackers had come to the airport by taxi and that preliminary findings pointed to Islamic State responsibility.
Two US counterterrorism officials familiar with the early stages of investigations said Islamic State was at the top of the list of suspects even though there was no evidence yet.
The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the use of suicide bombers against “soft” targets was more typical of Islamic State than that of the other obvious suspect, Kurdish PKK militants who generally attack official government targets.
One of the officials also said that, while Islamic State had recently stepped up attacks in Turkey, the group rarely claims responsibility because Turkey remains one of the main corridors for its fighters travelling from Europe to Syria and Iraq.
No group had claimed responsibility more than nine hours after the attack, which started around 9.50pm local time.
The attack bore similarities to a suicide bombing by Islamic State militants at Brussels airport in March that killed 16 people. A coordinated attack also targeted a rush-hour metro train, killing a further 16 people in the Belgian capital.
The United States said it stood in solidarity with Turkey, its Nato ally, and that such attacks would only reinforce their joint determination. United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon stressed the need to intensify global efforts to combat extremism.
AP, Reuters and Xinhau